dtpmike

What is the difference in the 3? I know that the lower the ohm the more power it will draw, but does the higher ohm soudn better or something like that?

------------------
89 camaro 305 tbi, flomaster 3 chamber cat back, gutted cat, Edlebrock TES Headers, Exhaust cutout, Edlebrock open element, 160 degree T-stat, Hurst Dual Gate shifter, Lakeland LCA's, and a Stage 2 FastChip.

2 kicker comp 12"'s, polk for the rest. Phoenix gold xs2300 to subs, kicker impulse 404XI to 4 speakers, pioneer DEH- P7000R head unit, and finally a 12 disc changer. Full leather interior from http://www.MrMikes.com

F-BodyNut

No, the lower ohm, the more power the speakers draw from your amp. Basically it allows for different wiring options and allows you to suck out as much power from your amp as possible.

Example. You have one amp and 2 12"s. The amp is two channels putting out 75wRMS and 150W Max to each channel in 4 Ohm. However when your bridge it it puts out 200wRMS x1 and 400WMax. Your getting 50 more RMS(continuous powers) and 100 more watts max. So you decide you want to bridge your amp and wire both speakers to the same channel. Well this could be good or bad.

1. Two speakers of the same OHM level wired in parallel(+ to +, - to -) produced half to ohm level. So if you had two 4ohm speakers wired to the the one channel of that AMP your created a 2OHM speaker load. However, because the amp is BRIDGED to create more power from one channel, it already has a 2ohm load at the amp. So your 2ohm speaker load wired into the already existing 2ohm amp load = 1ohm and your amp goes poof!.

Now this doesnt always happen but it is possible and more common to those who dont read up on this stuff and just drive their amps to hard. So how do you get around this problem? Two ways.

Buy 8 ohm subs. Wired them together and that creates a 4ohm load. Since normal speakers have a 4ohm load you can safely wire 2 8ohm speakers in parallel to the bridged amp and take advantage of the extra power gain.

or

IF the amp is rate 2ohm stable. Buy 2 ohm subs. The beauty of this is that because the amp is 2 ohm stable you can wire each 2 ohm sub to its own channel (not bridged) and receive the benefits of more power without having to bridge the amp. Thats because most amps ratings and power levels are done using 4ohm loads. If it is 2ohm stable (it should say in the manual) then you can use 2ohm speakers to draw more power out of the amp.

Thats not all of it though. You can wire in parallel as I spoked of or in serial which is a bit different and achieve different ohm levels with various numbers of speakers.

Hope this helps and a little and maybe some can come in and explain it a little better than I did.

F-BodyNut

KlayBuRn

Pioneer amps prolly arent 1 ohm stable, but i ran 2 12's off a pioneer gmx922 in 1 ohm mono for a year, and the same 12's on a pioneer premier gmx1022, and later on after i sold the 12's, i ran 2 15's off the pioneer premier amp also, didnt hurt them at all...

AJ_92RS

F-BodyNut is 100% correct. It's so nice to see people on here that know how to advise others instead of TELLING them what to do.

This part of your question was unanswered though. If you keep the ohm load at or around 4 ohms, then the sound quality (due to speaker control) will be more defined. If you look at the bridged rating of an amp compared to the stereo rating, then there is usually ("usually" being the operative word) a higher THD rating (Total Harmonic Distortion) in bridged mode. This allows the manufacture to advertise the output as being a little higher while still staying under the 0.1% THD level. Anything over .1% THD is said to be audible.

Ex. My RF Punch 100 is rated 50 watts/rms x 2 chnls @ .05% THD @ 4ohms. Bridged into 1 chnl @ 4 ohms (which is what F-BodyNut was saying, is the same as 2ohms on each of the 2 channels) the rating is 200 watts x 1 chnl @ .08% THD. Well, the higher you raise the THD level, the more power the amp is gonna put out at that level. It won't be as clear and defined though. If RF was to use .05% THD as the baseline for rating bridged mode, then the bridged output would be more around 150 watts. I'm guessing on that though.

Also, if you keep the resistance around 4 ohms per channel (or 8 ohms bridged) then the amp will live a happier, and longer life. It will run a lot cooler, and will draw a lot less current from your alt./batt.

I'm not saying that your amp will not last a reasonable amount of time if you decide to bridge it into a 4 ohm load. Or that you will be able to here a huge difference in sound quality (if any at all). I'm simply answering your question with facts as oppossed to opinion.

My RF amp is about 10yrs old and sounds great. It could just be "by chance", but I have always kept a 4/8 ohm load on it whether in stereo or bridged mode. Even my 1 12" I have now is an 8ohm. I hit 135.5 on the dB scale. That's plenty loud for me, especially knowing that the amp isn't struggling to stay alive.

Hope this helps a little more,
AJ

------------------
92 RS w/t-tops 305 TBI Auto.
170K miles and don't burn a drop o'oil
-K&N Truck filter #1500 w, open ele.
air cleaner
-Dynomax 2 1/2" cat-back
-B&M TransPak
-Jet Stage2 Chip
-180* T-Stat w/ 185* Fan Switch
-JVC CD--Alpine speakers & 4ch. amp
Rockford Punch 100. 1 - MTX 12" sub